“So what happened?” It was Madelyn, early the next morning, calling to check in.
If it were someone else, the caller’s motive might have been schadenfreude—that is to say, she might have been hoping to find me miserable so she could wallow in my misfortune. But Maddie wasn’t like that. Anyway, we Muffs saved our schadenfreude for our enemies.
“Not worth discussing,” I said.
“So it was
that
good.” She sounded bemused. “Want to talk about it?”
“Some day. Right now, I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“You didn’t sleep with him, did you?”
“Hell, no; nor would I ever sleep with any guy I met on the Internet on the first date, let alone the lying, incomprehensible, alcoholic freak from last night who gets his teeth over-Zoomed.”
“Is that even possible?”
“They might have been painted. I’m telling you, his teeth glowed.”
“Oh, well. They say it’s only a mistake if you don’t learn from it.”
“Believe me, I learned something all right: not enough due diligence. The whole thing could have been avoided. And I should have insisted we talk on the phone, but I let him convince me it was more romantic to just meet.”
She let out a long breath. “I want to tell you something, and it’s the only thing I’m going to say on the subject unless you ask—”
“I’m listening.”
“It sounds like this guy definitely had more than his share of issues, but everybody has something wrong with them. So if you want somebody, you’re going to need to decide what set of baggage you want to deal with. Like how my crazy Scot insists on calling me Bonnie Lass, and he’s always saying ‘jolly good’ this and ‘jolly’ that. The first few times it was cute, but now it makes me cringe. The thing is, I know there’s a really good guy in there, so I’m trying not to let it bother me.”
“I’d take ‘jolly good’ over the Venezuelan pussy monster any day.”
“He’s Venezuelan?”
“A Venezuelan who likens books to pussies.”
“As in...?”
“As in not cats. ‘So many poossies in de worhl and eeesh whan is deeferen, wayding doo bee deeskhover.’ ”
“Not much you can do with that.” She laughed, no doubt at my perfect imitation of John/Juan’s accent. “But speaking of books, you need to pick one, Quinn, right
now
. If you don’t, I’m going to hang up and drive to the last brick and mortar book store in the San Fernando Valley right now and pick one for you.”
“I’m sorry, I
have
been thinking about it. With millions of books coming out every year, you’d think I’d be able to find one.”
“Yes, you
would
think. Just choose already; what’s the worst that can happen? Anything will be better than that date you went on.”
“When will there be good news?”
“What’s that got to do with anything? It would be good news for all of us if you chose a book, I’ll tell you that much.”
“That’s my book pick:
When Will There Be Good News?
It’s by Kate Atkinson. I read it a couple of years ago, and it’s really good.”
“Sounds bleak.”
“She’s Scottish, like your boyfriend, what’s his-name?”
“Rory.”
She’d already told the Muffs his name, of course, but in my defense, she’d equivocated so many times—was still equivocating—that I hadn’t wanted to commit his name to memory. Plus, the romantic in me still saw her with Udi, or even Cullen—the adorable writer she met while shopping for vibrators. If I had gone to Babeland with her that day as I was supposed to, it might have been me who’d struck up a conversation with the charming Cullen, and I wouldn’t be searching for love on the Internet. But no, I hadn’t joined her that afternoon because I chose instead to go on a lousy date with a wannabe actor.
“Rory, right. Jolly good, then,” I teased. “By the way, lass, if you were thinking of doing your book shopping at Barnes and Noble, I dinna think they’ll have it.”
“Well, I don’t read electronic anymore,” she said, choosing to ignore my attempt at a Scottish accent. “Reading’s less satisfying. I guess I’ll have to order it from Amazombie. Damn, I wanted to buy something
today
.”
“How ’bout a latte?”
A few hours later, Madelyn and I pulled into a parking spot on Montana Avenue in Santa Monica. She had secured an afternoon of quality, age-appropriate activity for Lila while, at the same time, bowing out of Rory’s hurling competition. I didn’t probe too deeply into the nature of what hurling was, beyond determining that Rory’s brand of this activity had nothing to do with vomiting and everything to do with Gaelic pride. From what I could tell, it was an Irish sport played by some Scots involving sticks with sharp edges, a hard ball, and the possibility of grievous bodily injury. No wonder she didn’t care to watch.
Lined with shops and cafes, Montana Avenue borders some of the most expensive real estate in L.A., and it’s one of the destination streets scattered around our megalopolis where a girl can do some serious damage with her credit cards. It’s also prime people watching territory, attracting both those living in the nearby expensive homes as well as people like us—those whom marketers refer to as “aspirational,” who are also the type to make any shopping street a destination on a weekend afternoon.
“I hope you’ll keep this between us, which means don’t tell Jelicka,” Maddie said as she fed the meter for her parked Prius. “But I have to get this off my chest.”
“Okay.”
“You know when you called me from Japan after you thought you saw Udi at the airport?”
“Yes.” Seriously, did she think I’d forget?
She looked ahead, down the block, and pulled me under the awning of Planet Blue. “It’s not that I didn’t believe you. I’m willing to concede that the events surrounding Udi’s—let’s just call it
collapse
—were definitely odd. But the thing is, I don’t see what there is to do about it now.”
“I know. I realized that after I cooled down and was on the plane, and I’m sorry. All I did was upset you, and myself—aside from waking you up, of course.”
She waved her hand dismissively. “Doesn’t matter. I’m the one who should be sorry; I sort of lost it on you.”
“No worries.” And no point laying blame.
“You want to know what’s really screwed up?” She took a deep breath and released it slowly. “If you
hadn’t
told me you saw Udi, and I found out later somehow, I would have been upset by
that
.” She smiled wistfully. “It’s like seeing your friend’s husband with another woman, and you’re not sure if you should tell her, you know?
Awkward
.”
“I just thought you’d want to know, I guess. Because
I’d
want to know.”
“Sorry I took your head off.”
“Stop, it’s fine. I made the plane.”
She peered into the window of a high-end eyeglass store. “Did you, you know,
do
anything about it?”
“You mean beyond telling you I saw him? No. There was really nothing
to
do.”
“That’s the thing I keep coming back to,” she said. “Even if one of us tried to get somebody to listen, who would believe us?”
“Maybe in this age of picking up cellphone conversations and monitoring everybody’s every move, someone
would
believe us. Who knows? It could just be a matter of going back through cellphone records, finding where Udi called you, track his number, and see who else he called; then they track all the people whose numbers he called, particularly those who might be from countries on U.S. watch lists.”
Maddie smirked. “What movie is
that
plotline from?”
She wasn’t far off. One of the dangers of working in the entertainment business is that the line between life and filmed entertainment blurs to the point of singularity. But in this case, it wasn’t a movie, unfortunately.
“I’m talking headlines.
The New York Times
and
Huff Po
. This stuff is really happening. I think that’s how they caught the blind sheik; one of those ISIL guys anyway.”
She looked up. “A drone could be capturing our meeting and listening in with high-tech sonar monitoring equipment at this very moment.”
The only visible thing in the sky was a plane high overhead, barely audible. Otherwise, it was a typically gorgeous, clear Southern California day with a few cumulus clouds spotting the blue.
“Maybe we can’t see them,” I said. “They’re shrouded in the cloak of invisibility.”
“You’re mashing up your blockbuster flicks.”
“Why not? Everyone else does. That’s how they come up with the next one.”
She waved skyward. “Hello up there! We’re going to eat now.”
“Yeah, we’ll let you know what we had when we come back out.”
She turned to me and said quietly, “I think about him a lot.”
“I know.” Standing on the sidewalk, I put my arm around her shoulders, and we stood there for a few minutes saying nothing.
Finally, she shook her head and collected herself. “So, what’s it going to be, Quinn?”
I glanced toward the west end of Montana where Babalu served local, yummy fare. Doing a 180, I then faced east and the eponymous mainstay, Cafe Montana, with its usual Sunday brunch crowd out front waiting. As I began to turn back to her, I spotted a familiar face. He was not too far from us, maybe 200 feet away on the sidewalk. It was the same guy I’d seen the night before at Boa and the same guy who’d been at Firefly. This time, he wore a baseball cap, but it was the
same guy.
The creep factor suddenly dialed up inside me big time.
This was no longer any kind of coincidence
.
“Don’t look right away, but there’s a guy on the sidewalk over there with a Yankees cap on.”
“Oh, yeah—think it’s Udi?” She was jibing me. “Or...what if it’s someone from the Department of Homeland Security who overheard our conversation when you were in Japan and now he’s looking to make contact.”
“This is no joke, Maddie. I’ve seen the guy several times recently—he was at Firefly last week when we were there. He was also at the restaurant last night, and now he’s here. He’s got to be following me.”
Sensing my angst, Maddie quickly dropped the attitude. She focused her gaze up the street to where “Yankees” was still standing. “I can’t really see his features from here, but I can tell it’s not Udi.”
“No, it’s not Udi.”
“Is it possible you and Paige both have stalkers?”
I took a moment to reflect on the events of the last couple of weeks. “I may have even seen him even
before
Firefly, but I can’t remember where.”
Maddie’s mantle of the pre-possessed attorney-mediator had been restored. “And you have no idea who it is?
“None.”
“I just don’t think it’s possible that more than one Muff has a stalker.”
“We’re The Muffia,” I said. “I’m surprised we don’t all have one.”
She smiled. “Good point.”
“How is
Paige anyway? Have you seen her? Did anyone ever find out what happened?”
Maddie shook her head. “Lauren saw her, and Sarah, too, I think. Apparently, she has a massive shiner, poor thing. And she definitely put a restraining order on the guy.”
“Really? Yikes.”
“Soon he’ll be tormenting women at some other tennis club, though Paige should keep her eyes open; he could be back. Restraining orders get broken all the time.”
“Why don’t we go see her? She’s probably feeling lousy, like we abandoned her,” I said.
“We’ll call her later. Come on, let’s eat.” She turned me around. “Don’t look back. If he
is
a stalker, you don’t want to let him know you know he’s there, right?”
“Right.”
And with that, we headed toward Babalu without so much as one backward glance.
“If somebody
were
following you,” Maddie said, picking up a raisin pumpernickel roll from the basket of artisanal breads, “let’s figure out who might do that and what the reason would be.” She slathered butter onto the roll. “Other than your beauty, of course, or your pole dancing skills, celebrity access—perhaps even your connection to me and Udi, international man of mystery.”
I glanced out Babalu’s plate glass window for the third time since we’d sat down, worried I’d see the man in the Yankees cap hovering nearby. “You joke, but I’m not making this up.”
“I didn’t say you were.” She was about to take a bite of her buttered roll. “Do you think he has something to do with the pictures that were sent to your boss? And if so, who hired him?”
The questions didn’t surprise me; it’s not like I hadn’t been wondering about these things myself. In fact, the only times I
hadn’t
been thinking about Picturegate was when I was pole dancing and out on my lousy date. I slurped a spoonful of cream of asparagus soup, savoring the flavor.
“The answer is ‘He
might
have something to do with the pictures,’ ” I said. “And there are three possibilities as to who could have hired him. The first is Talent Partners—they could be having me followed to find out if I really am the insane lunatic they see in the pictures; or maybe their attorney told them they needed additional proof of crazy behavior before firing me in order to avoid a lawsuit.”
“Possibly,” said Maddie, chewing. “It would depend on the termination clause in your contract. Do you remember the terms?”
I shook my head. “What’s the point in understanding an employment contract when questioning the terms means they won’t hire you? They can put whatever they want in those contracts, unless the prospective employee has some sort of superior negotiating ability, which I obviously didn’t have.”
She shrugged. “You might take a look anyway. But, I don’t know, I doubt they’d have you followed.”
“Okay, I’ll check just to be sure.”
“It’s too bad employment isn’t my area of expertise, or I’d volunteer to mediate.”
Madelyn was always looking for opportunities to resolve conflict. She mediated so rarely, she didn’t care any more if somebody thought she was biased, which she would clearly be in this case, given she was my friend.
“The second possibility as to who hired him is Titania. She’s having me followed, hoping to get me in another compromising position to strengthen her case.”